I already learned a lot in this forum by analyzing games, watching videos and helping annotating games and since the new idea of Training Journals has come to mind I thought I would give it a try. We can help each other improve

Armis, looks like you have a great training plan. If you can stick with it, you'll improve very quickly. 60 minutes a day of solving tactics will be good. What book/tool are you using? Similarly I'm curious where you're getting the positional exercises.

As far as the endings go, you should look into Van Perlo's Endgame Tactics. The book is incredible. The examples are really fun and they help one learn endings in much the same way one studies tactics. If you're interested, there is a review here.

Analyzing one's own games is an important part of training and something I've never been very good at. So I'll try to do the same! Also I think making a video per month will really help your chess. I've found that not only is it fun, but it has really helped me solidify my knowledge of the ideas I discuss.

I have some chess programs from http://www.convekta.com. So I solve endgames and tactical exercises using those programs.
For positional ones I use Jeremy Silman's excellent book HOW TO REASSESS YOUR CHESS WORKBOOK and I have recently scanned a copy of Jacob Aagaard's EXCELLING AT POSITIONAL CHESS which is pretty much the same but I find most of the excercises more difficult. CAN YOU BE A POSITIONAL CHESS GENIUS? is one of my favorites as well
Yes, analyzing games is tough. I found that the best way to do it is to analyze the game yourself and only then check your evaluations with a computer program. I also try to find the best practical solutions, since computers don't panic once their king is running all other the board for example. Pawn sacs not playable against computers can lead to favorable complications in an OTB game and so on.
I agree making chess videos is a great tool to teach by learning. I understood some aspects which I didn't even think about after the game. And the endgame video I did, I still remember every single example
By the way, thanks for mentioning that book! I'll try to find a scanned one on the internet

I've heard Excelling at Positional Chess is very good. I'll make sure to check it out.

Today I discovered a simple yet effective trick. After solving positional exercises I write down what I've learned, might sound stupid but I find this very effective
I think about doing the same when analyzing games and writting down where did I go wrong, where did I think wrong, evaluate the position wrong and so on. Just to get a list of what should I be working on most

That's a pretty cool idea. I think I might try that too. Are you writing down a simple idea you learned from the position? Maybe you could post an example...I'd really appreciate it.

Sure

The lessons I learned are in bold text

This exercise comes from EXCELLING AT POSITIONAL CHESS, excellent book by the way.


You might want so solve it so I'll post my comment in hidden mode Good luck!

Hidden Text Below - [Show it] - [Hide it Again]

This was not the only one I solved today, but another lesson I learned is that important is not the objective value of the position at the end of a variation but did my position improve?
By the way, I think about starting teaching chess online, I already have a candidate who seems interested ( a player from a correspondence chess sie I'm playing), should be fun

Hope you liked the exercise, cheers

Armis, I think it's really cool that you're going to be teaching online. Maybe you could talk about it in your journal some or we could trade ideas. I've just started teaching online (although I have some experience over the board) and I'm really enjoying it.

The position you posted is really cool. I didn't see black's move at all! What I like about it is that it turns the tables on white. White is just going along slowly consolidating into a better position when suddenly black throws white off balance. I also like the positional aspects of black's moves. I'll have to check out Aaragard's book.

I'll be going near the sea next week so borrowed a book LIFE AND GAMES OF MIKHAIL TAL from a friend of mine. Reviews say it's an excellent book. It's one of my new goals as well, to study the games of one of my favorites and brilliant attacking players of all time
I find the training schedule I made very rewarding for me. I corrected some points in it which i discovered other my training hours: writting down what I've learned and calculating variations which I didn't see during tactical exercises. Often I am bit lasy calculating so I thought that from now on I will try really hard and remove this weakness of calculating and make calculating my strength

Here's another example of how sometimes the piece count doesn't matter, but the activeness does matter:

[Event "Open NK"]
[Site "Dieren"]
[Date "2007.07.27"]
[Round "4"]
[White "Otte, Marijn"]
[Black "Klein, David"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "B96"]
[PlyCount "131"]
[EventDate "2007.??.??"]

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. Bg5 e6 7. f4 Qc7 8. Qf3
b5 9. Bxf6 gxf6 10. e5 d5 11. exf6 b4 12. Nxd5 exd5 13. Qxd5 Bb7 14. Bb5+ axb5
15. Nxb5 Qc6 16. Qe5+ Kd8 17. O-O-O+ Kc8 18. Rhe1 Bc5 19. Qf5+ Nd7 20. Rxd7
Qxd7 21. Qxc5+ Qc6 22. Qf5+ Qd7 23. Re7 Qxf5 24. Nd6+ Kd8 25. Nxb7+ Kc8 26.
Nd6+ Kd8 27. Nxf7+ Kc8 28. Nd6+ Kd8 29. Nxf5 Rxa2 30. Nd6 Rf8 31. Nb7+ Kc8 32.
f7 Ra8 33. g4 Rb8 34. f5 b3 35. f6 bxc2 36. Nd6+ Kd8 37. Re8+ Kc7 38. Rxb8 Kxb8
39. g5 Kc7 40. Ne4 Rxf7 41. h4 Kc6 42. Ng3 Kd5 43. Nf5 Ke5 44. Nh6 Rf8 45. Kxc2
Kf4 46. f7 Rc8+ 47. Kd3 Ke5 48. b4 Kd6 49. Kd4 Ke7 50. b5 Kf8 51. Kd5 Rc1 52.
b6 Kg7 53. b7 Rb1 54. Kc6 Rc1+ 55. Kd7 Rb1 56. Kc8 Rc1+ 57. Kb8 Rh1 58. h5 Rb1
59. g6 hxg6 60. hxg6 Rf1 61. Kc7 Rc1+ 62. Kd6 Rb1 63. Nf5+ Kf8 64. Ke6 Rb6+ 65.
Nd6 Rb1 66. Kf6
1-0

It's a dubious variation of the Najdorf, where white just sacrifices two pieces. Even though white has no real mate threats yet or obvious ways of winning material, he still wins because black's pieces aren't doing anything (the rooks on a8 and h8 expecially).

Life and Games of Mikhail Tal is a really fun book. If you're looking for another game collection from a creative attacking player, check out The Sorcerer's Apprentice. It's a book of David Bronstein's games. One of my favorite game collections of all time.

Phobetor thanks for posting this game, I'll have a look at it tomorrow.

Joshspecht, yes I have heard that it's a good one as well. I'll try to get that one as soon as I finish Tal.

I'm going near the sea for a week, wish you luck at the chessboards! I'll miss this forum
My two goals there : Finish reading UNDERSTANDING THE GRUNFELD
read LIFE AND GAMES OF MIKHAIL TAL
cheers

Enjoy your week at the sea! I hope we get a training journal update and a full trip report when you get back

Thanks JoshSpecht

Finally I'm back . I had a great time although got a bit sunburn . The best part of my vacation is that I had a chance to play a chess game against a guy who in his youth (back in 80's ) was playing in tournaments and managed to reach about 2200 back then ( ratings were different in those days I think, not sure how much ). I very much enjoyed playing in the beach: sea, sand, birds, fresh air and a little bit of sun, that was simply fantastic As I promised in training journal I'll try to analyze my game very carefully and post it here, I'll post it in REPLAYS AND ANALYSIS as well.
I've tried to keep up training according to my schedule during the time near the sea and I found it rewarding. I've also noticed that my major problem is too little OTB games, I benefit mostly from annotating those. I've been playing correspondence chess and solving exercises mostly, but during OTB games I'm afraid of things I shouldn't be afraid at all. So that's the problem I'll be working on. I'll update my training schedule a bit
I've almost finished UNDERSTANDING THE GRUNFELD, the opening that I feel most comfortable in. I've been reading LIFE AND GAMES OF MIKHAIL TAL ( a great book ) as well, although I managed to read only 1/5 of it, I truly enjoyed studying his games. By the way, I've ordered two books: Silman's endgame course and Van Perlo's endgame tactics, can't wait to get them!
I've been working on my second endgame video too, but didn't have enough time lately . I'll try to finish it to the end of the month.
By the way, the game Phobetor posted from the first glance looks impressive. I didn't go into much detail, but the theme of the game was very clear: the piece count doesn't matter. Thanks Phobetor

Cheers